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| Enough of this insanity already |
Several years ago I worked in retail briefly during the Christmas season when I was laid off from my regular job. There's no way to put this nicely--it sucked. It's a thankless job where you're dealing with bitchy customers, bitchy managers and if you're lucky, getting paid $10 an hour to do so while being on your feet all day. I worked at a Crate&Barrel which had to be replenished every night after closing or the manager wouldn't allow us to leave. In fact, she locked us in until she was satisfied--something that I'm pretty sure is illegal.
But I digress--I think it's extremely offensive that anyone should have to work on Thanksgiving--or even Black Friday for that matter. What is up with this stupid obsession over Black Friday, anyway? Are we so greedy and materialistic that our idea of a good way to spend the day after turkey day is to wait in line for hours at night and scramble through the opening doors in a mad rush for the chance to get 40% off a flat screen TV? Would it kill retailers to remain closed for at least 24 hours to give their employees some well-deserved rest and a day to spend with family and loved ones? Can they really not take their minds off the almighty dollar for one day?
Thanksgiving is a day for this:
And this:
And this:
It is NOT, however, a day for this:
Or this:
Black Friday, by its definition, has been around since the 1960s. The name was coined in Philadelphia, and was used to define the pedestrian and automotive traffic that occurred in the city the day after Thanksgiving. At first, many stores would open earlier than usual to accommodate eager holiday shoppers--6 A.M. was the average start time. But in the past dozen years, that time has crept up to 5 AM...4 AM...even 3 AM. Now the standard opening for most retail chains is midnight, but some Walmart and Target stores are planning on opening earlier...at 8 PM which is technically still Thanksgiving Day. When will it end?
I think our grandparents and great-grandparents would be appalled by the spending spree spectacle that Black Friday has become.
Somehow, like a pimple, it's grown into this humongous, overhyped holiday event of its own. I sure don't remember the day attracting this much hoopla when I was growing up. How nice it would be to force people to stay home until 8 AM on the day after Thanksgiving, actually R-E-S-P-E-C-T (as Aretha Franklin would say) the holiday, and give the retail worker a well deserved break and a full night's sleep. I wrote a while ago about the death of the Blue Laws and why we should bring them back. I absolutely hope this consumerism and greediness burns itself out and fast.
Plus, did everyone suddenly forget this year that shoppers have DIED during Black Friday mayhem? People have been trampled; a pregnant woman miscarried. So you could get your dirty mitts on a television set? Really???
Sadly, with so many Americans out of work, we know that if Walmart and Target employees went on strike in protest, the stores would have no problem finding replacements waiting in the wings.
I really hope the retailers come to their senses, or some laws are eventually put in place to keep them closed on a national holiday. In the meantime, while the shopping fools are freezing their asses waiting in the dark for a deal on an Wii Thursday night, I'll be warm in my bed sleeping off a turkey coma.
